Windows XP slow to open applications

[Chrisjc]

Everyone has all had really good points here, however let us all not forget another important thing to do on a weekly to monthly bases is to perform a "disk defrag" on your Hard Drive. This will improve performance as well...

Now you do have a low amount of RAM and with ever evolving technology it is becoming a lot more necessary for a user to be running 2 + gigs of RAM. It sounds like your PC maybe older so you might only be able to cap it out at 1gig or right at 2 gigs. You could also change your Paging size to allow your Hard Drive to help with some cache.

In case some didn’t explain how to obtain new RAM here are some instructions for you.

1. Find out the Brand of your PC "Make & model number" You can usually find this located on your PC's Tower.

2. Go to the manufactures website for example "hp.com" find their support section and type in your Serial Number located on your PC tower.

3. Once you located your machine look for "Specifications " You will be seeking your RAM or aka Memory.

4. You can order more RAM from your manufacture but in most cases I do not suggest this as you tend to pay for a name rather than the item it’s self. A great source is "newegg.com "

5. If the site didn’t list your RAM type or max size you can call support and ask them exactly which type to get and how much your machine will support.

Instructions for changing your paging memory

1. Go to "Start >: RIGHT CLICK: My Computer > Properties.

2. Your System Properties will then be displayed, Go to the "Advanced tab"
3. Under the "Advanced tab find "Performanc e & click on: Settings:"

4. Click on the "Advanced tab & look for: Virtual Memory: click on Change"

5. Now there are a few options here you can either let your system decided, in fact that might already be your default. But if you have an initial size and max size already set, I always found it best to match both initial and max size to the same value that your initial is set to. You could also use 2048 - 2048 or 4092 - 4092.

These steps are for Windows XP SP2 & newer.

To run Disk Defragment do the following.

1.Start > All Programs > Accessories > System Tools > Disk Defragmenter

2.Once Disk Defragmenter is open simply hit “Defragmen t”

3.Do not try and use your PC at this point while this program is running as it is very intensive on your machine and will cause a lot of lag if you are trying to do anything.

NOTE: This operation can take up to several hours to complete so it is best to let it run over night epically if you have never ran it before, once you start running it more often it will not take as long because your hard drive will stay nice and organized.

This concludes the steps you need to follow to help improve system performance, some suggestions where already made by experts and possible steps but just in case here they are. Good luck.

-Chris

[hodbod]

still having problems

Hi
I have win xp, 2 meg of ram and still my files are slow to open. Helllp!!!

My subscription to mcaffee finiished so i completely uninstalled it. Check to see if files were any faster. No is the answer.

It is slow when i open all files and also when i right click a file to see properties it takes ages to open that.

If i open the program first (like word, dreamweaver etc) and open the file from that program, ie go to 'file', then 'open' it is instant.

Can anybody help please

Chris

[justwantananswer]

Stop Network DDE service

Had the same problem (2GB RAM, recently defraged all hard disks) and just fixed a few minutes ago.

Go to "Control Panel" -> "Administra tive Tools" -> "Services", find and stop the following services:

Network DDE
Network DDE DSDM

Note, you may be prompted that the depending services will also be stopped, e.g. "ClipBook", do it but record all the services you stopped so you can start them if you need them later.

[majong]

Applications slow to open.

There are a few very good reasons why applications take slow to open, no matter what operating system you use.

Here are the reasons:
1. Not enough RAM (512MB isn't sufficient if you are into multitasking)
Between 1 and 2 GB is what you need in today's world.
2. The antivirus programs that you use may be using too much
memory, and checks every application you try to use before it opens, hence
slowing down the opening process.
Norton is notorious for doing this, and the others that follow suit are
AVG, and Avast antivirus programs which I have thoroughly
tested.
My recommendation is to use Windows Security Essentials which is
a free program from microsoft.
3. Build up of invalid files in registry, cache, and junk files, including the build up
of files in Windows\Prefetc h folder. These need to be cleared
regularly.

Once all of the above has been taken care of, reboot your system and you will notice the difference.
One more minor detail .... do a speed test before you make changes, then run another speed test after you have made the changes and notice the difference.

Speed test link: http://www.speedtest.net/

Cheers, and Happy computing.

Majong

[MortenXP]

In the end you can just disable the indexing service; Control panel -> Administrative Tools -> Services -> find Indexing Service, right click, properties, Start-up Type = Disabled;

Net result, searching for documents using windows search might be slightly slower, but if you only use this feature once in a while the advice is to turn it off. Problem solved.

Morten

[jlprice013]

I tried this (turning off real-time protection) and my opening/closing lag with Firefox went away. My thanks

[jlprice013]

I should note that it did not fix my lag when opening OpenOffice, which I'll have to deal with another way.

[hydersharif]

There are several reasons in this regards.Mainly this happens when your registry full of different useless things and when your hard drive have no space. In this purpose you can use PC Registry Shield. I hope it will very effective